Too-Convenient Truths in <cite>An Inconvenient Truth</cite>, Part One

Share

Too-Convenient Truths in <cite>An Inconvenient Truth</cite>, Part One

So which of Al Gore's inconvenient truths did a British court deem a little too convenient? Did he do everyone a favor and ask for a director's cut stripped of all those scenes where Al Gore schleps through airports and stares soulfully out of windows and strides like a gladiator down darkened tunnels to his appointed ... um ... speaking engagement?

The Guardian has a rundown of the judge's contentions, some of which were fairly small and didn't contradict the central hypotheses of the film. These, the judge agreed, were supported by a preponderance of peer-reviewed evidence. Read more about 'em after the jump.

Claim: "The film claimed that low-lying inhabited Pacific atolls "are being inundated because of anthropogenic global warming" - but there was no evidence of any evacuation occurring."

WiSci Response: Only if people from Tuvaluand Vanuatu aren't really people.

Claim: "It spoke of global warming "shutting down the ocean conveyor" -the process by which the gulf stream is carried over the north Atlantic to western Europe. The judge said that, according to theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, it was "very unlikely" that the conveyor would shut down in the future, though it might slow down."*

*WiSci Response: Fair enough, though the supplementary materials should explain that a slowdown is still quite possible and pretty scary, too.

Claim: "Mr Gore had also claimed - by ridiculing the opposite view -that two graphs, one plotting a rise in C02 and the other the rise in temperature over a period of 650,000 years, showed "an exact fit". The judge said although scientists agreed there was a connection, "the two graphs do not establish what Mr Gore asserts.""